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Safe and private browsing

Cocoon is an add-on for Firefox and Internet Explorer that aims to make your time online as safe as possible.

As far as privacy apps go, Cocoon is very, very discreet. Once it is enabled, all you will see is an attractive blue toolbar that doesn’t even look like one. You’ll need a free Cocoon account to use the service. Once you have a username and password, sign into Cocoon and begin to browse. According to the developers, Cocoon will establish “a secure encrypted connection to the Internet”, so that nobody can see who you are or what you are doing.

It’s pretty hard to gauge the accuracy of this claim on a casual basis, but from our testing, it seemed promising. We could access geographically restricted websites, meaning our location was hidden, and we couldn’t log into websites without re-entering our log-in information, meaning we were cookie-free. Cocoon also claims to protect you from viruses and malware you might pick up online.

Cocoon doesn’t stop there. It also allows you to create a throw-away email address – Mailslots – that allow you risk-free sign-ups when a website or service absolutely demands your details. It also has its own history feature and a cookie eraser. All your information is stored “in the cloud”, so whatever you do in Cocoon (bookmarks, notes, etc.), it is also available from wherever you log in.

Bear in mind, however, that using Cocoon does effect lots of settings in Firefox, even after it has been uninstalled. Although the add-on was very useful while we were using it, we had a hard time getting everything back to normal once we were done.

Cocoon is a user-friendly and discreet app that will keep you as safe and private as possible when working online.

Notes

For technical reasons, the download link will take you to the Cocoon website where you can sign up for an account and download the add-on.